


5 Things That RJ Does That Sends Maine Off-Kilter

by audi



Series: A Day In The Life: Plus Ones [1]
Category: AlDub - Fandom
Genre: AlDub - Freeform, F/M, MaiChard - Freeform, eat bulaga, kalyeserye
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-11-04
Updated: 2016-11-04
Packaged: 2018-08-29 00:35:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,930
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8469016
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/audi/pseuds/audi
Summary: Sometimes, she really just wants to wrangle his neck. 
Most of the time, though...





	

STANDARD DISCLAIMER APPLIES. THIS IS A WORK OF FICTION. 

\---

1 - OCD

When RJ needs to get up earlier than Maine, which is almost always (because of his own rituals, and his call time), whether it is in his unit or hers, and especially, especially when they are in Laguna, he still fixes the sheets of his bed even when she is still sleeping on the bed. 

At first she thought it was sweet. And it was, it still is, it was just that too many sleep has been interrupted because he was "tucking her in" even when she was very tucked in, so to speak. 

Sometimes she sleeps in through his tucking in (when she came from a tvc shoot at 5am and had a call time the day before at 6am, or when RJ was particulary attentive that night and he tired her out) and she'd wake up, barely able to move, because the blanket and the cot covered her from neck to toe. 

The first time it happened she'd nearly had a heart attack - she thought somebody came in and she was being attacked. The second time she'd fought her way out of the cocoon. The third time she'd just rolled her eyes and sent a prayer of thanks that RJ didn't turn off the AC. 

Every time though, she always kicked and punched, because that was reflex for her whenever she feels suffocated both literally and figuratively. Every time, she promises herself that this would be it, the last he did that, that he has to choose between wrapping her like lumpia or her never sleeping with him again, connotations attached.

Her convictions die when he flashes her his bedimpled sheepish grin when they see each other for the first time everyday. 

2 - KULIT

Maine is, by nature, an introvert. 

There is no one exempted from the walls and the silence and the quietness when she wants to go back to her shell - not her family, not her friends, not even past flames. 

The first time it happened when she finally got together with RJ (who got oriented with her silence spells by Maine herself, Coleen by giving a very detailed dos and donts, the rest of her family, her friends, and Janeeva), he did not leave her side. He talked and talked and talked about his day, about his plans, about their future. He did not let her build space - he held her hand, traced patterns on her palms, kissed her fingers, bit her shoulders, enveloped her in his arms, nuzzled her neck, buried his face on her hair, kissed her jawline, her forehead, her nose, her mouth. She never responded, but he didn't seem to mind, and Maine was flabbergasted. She's never met anyone who was unshaken by the walls she seems to have been born with, and has reinforced with time. He was bordering on intrusive, but he did it so meticulously that by the time he was done she was shocked that he has already made his bed with her inside. 

She wanted to be angry with him for crossing that invisible line. She wanted to rage at him for not leaving anything of her for herself, that she has become so immersed with him that she feels she doesn't have anything hers alone. 

So she beat at his chest and pushed him and he went with her blows, until the back of his knees hit the coffee table and he grabbed at her wrists and she fought back but he overbalanced so he fell on the floor of the living room in her unit. She fell with him, and she landed on top of him, her hands stretched above her head, her eyes on level with him. She felt herself go warm, and she bent down to capture his mouth, and he met her halfway, tongue darting out to engage with hers. She tugged at his clothes, bit and sucked at his neck, scraped her nails down his chest, his sides, until she reached the top of his pants and yanked at belt until he batted her hands away and she wrestled with his button. 

When she raised her eyes to meet his, dark and burning with lust and anger and love, she willingly surrendered to the turmoil of emotions he always, always brings. 

3 - JEALOUS

There is a saying that jealousy is good for a relationship - it is the affirmation of love, of the want of your presence in their lives. Maine disagrees - jealousy is the need of just one to be just the one in someone's life. It speaks of doubt, of suspicions, of broken trust. She hates all of them. 

Maine is not a saint. She would be the first to admit it. She doesn't understand why people paint her as such, why they think she's this meek, little, wisp of a girl who doesn't know how to fight. She knows how to fight. She has fought. She just chooses her battles, and is very selective in every war she wages. She's afraid of failing, so she doesn't fail. 

RJ, too, has been stereotyped to be a gentleman, an all around good guy, generally like sheep. Maine isn't saying he isn't - RJ is the best among the guys she has dated; RJ is the epitome of the man of her dreams. As much as people would like to say how emotionally mature RJ is, there are some things that make the man regress into a two year old: selfish, territorial, possessive. All these characteristics are cute on a boy. On RJ...

Jealous RJ is not cute, he isn't hot, he does not turn her on. She's a nervous wreck when RJ starts showing the signs of jealousy - he gets quiet, he becomes taller, his presence oppressive, and he sort of looms over everything. He doesn't let her go anywhere outside of his reach - literally. He would always be touching her, intimately, playing with her hair, a hand on her lower back, arm slung over her shoulders with his fingers playing with her necklace, a button of her blouse, his hand inside her jean pockets, all the while looking uninterested at all the comings and goings. Maine isn't a tactile person, especially on public. The little displays of intimacy, if done by another person, would have caused her to run. 

The first time it happened, it was with Miggy. She and RJ weren't yet together, and she didn't even know where she stood with him then. Sure, he sent food wherever the JFA team were, and they always had a supply of her favorite sweets, but she never thought anything of it. He never actually said anything, as well. Maine just thought that was how he was, sweet and caring, as what everyone kept telling her. 

So Miggy arrived, the last week of October, after Tamang Panahon. He went to visit her on the set of MBL, with some of their friends, coincidentally on the day that RJ wasn't on location. They were in her tent, laughing over something or another when the flap opened and when Maine turned, RJ was a sight. His countenance was dark, his eyes were intense, his jaw clenched, his lips pursed into a thin line. Almost unconsciously, Maine jumped up and went to him, introducing Miggy and doing a roll call of everyone elseto RJ - who very casually started playing with her hair. He readily took the handshake Miggy offered, but he didn't move from where he was standing after introductions were done. So they all stood there, the 8 of them, her girlfriends (for all their rooting for hers and Miggy's forever) awestruck with Alden Richards. Miggy tried to keep the conversation going, and RJ was accommodating, and polite, but he was distant and cold. Her friends also tried to bring Maine back with them, invite her for a late recap, but every warning signal in Maine's head was blaring, so she turned them down. It helped, or not, depending on whose point view you are looking at, that at the issue of the invitation, RJ so obviously stepped closer to her until her back was against his chest, and she could feel the heat his body was giving off. His hand was on her hip, thumb caressing the strip of bare skin. That set of friends never visited the MBL set ever again. Come to think of it, they lay off her case after that incident. Hmm, weird, that. 

Which was fine, as RJ said his piece after that, going to and fro Bulacan every single day until the shooting of the movie finished, until after that, until her parents conceded to her staying over at their condo unit near Broadway, until she found RJ staying over, with his own set of keys courtesy of her mother, until RJ was staying over at her unit more than his own. 

Until she suddenly found herself leaning on his touches, yearning for them, initiating them. 

4 - TOUCH

It isn't a secret that RJ is a clingy person - everyone, and it means everyone, in this business knows that. RJ cannot finish a coversation without touching them. On the hand, shoulders, back. He hugs everyone. He's...touchy. 

This is one of the reasons why Maine never thought anything of his...overtures. The arm attached to her shoulders. The hand on her waist, her wrist, her elbow. She thought that was just how he was, and she made adjustments for his sake. 

When he made his intentions clear, after the Miggy debacle, she felt somewhat uncomfortable with his touches, and he noticed. They talked about it, and in all fairness, he tried. Tried. But typical of RJ, he slowly got her used to him - his touch, his presence, until she would be annoyed with him more for not touching her. 

Whenever that happened though, she would catch RJ's self-satisfied smirk, and would just shake her head. Goddamn the man and his uncanny habit of changing her. 

5 - GUARANTEE

Maine went into the relationship with RJ with a guarded heart. She was sure of RJ yes, but she wasn't sure of herself. She just couldn't take RJ weeping and kneeling and pleading for a real relationship - one with labels, because what she was going for at that time wasn't enough for him. He wanted commitment. He wanted exclusivity. It was all good for her heart but her brain wasn't buying everything a hundred percent.

A Maine pushed into a corner pushes back, subtle, yes, but she fights until she can run away, and RJ knows this. What he did nearly made Maine die of shock. Man in question approached her father, who talked with her mother, and then the 3 of them talked to her. She found herself agreeing to the points her parents made, and before the day was over she was girlfriend to one Richard Faulkerson Jr, who was grinning from ear to ear. 

She was going to let it pass, because much as she went against this relationship - she felt it was too fast, that maybe he was just pressured into it, that maybe she isn't ready to love him as much as he deserved - she knows she loves him already, knows that she is in love with him, irrevocably. 

Until he raised the point of marriage after a year of going steady, and the same thing happened all over again. She was going to kill this man, at some point in her life, she swears. 

\+ 1: The One Thing She Can't Live Without

RJ.


End file.
